Qualys - Powerful cloud-based security services for your digital assets protection (Review 2021)
What is Qualys?
Qualys is a cloud-based compliance and web application security service. You can easily assess your website by accessing Qualys through the website as it is a SaaS model. It helps businesses simplify IT security operations and lower the cost of compliance.
The services by Qualys are available for both free and premium. The premium service is called the Qualys Cloud Platform. This service delivers critical security intelligence on demand and automates the full spectrum of auditing, compliance, and protection for internet perimeter systems, internal networks, and web applications. Meanwhile, the free service covers the Community Edition, SSL Labs, and many more.
Founded in 1999, Qualys was the first company to deliver vulnerability management solutions as applications through the web using a “software as a service” (SaaS) model. Since then, Qualys has had over 10,300 customers in more than 130 countries, including a majority of the Forbes Global 100. The company has partnerships with major organizations including Microsoft, Dell SecureWorks, Fujitsu, and IBM. Besides that, the company is also a founding member of the Cloud Security Alliance (CSA).
What does Qualys do?
The Qualys Cloud Platform and its integrated suite of security and compliance solutions offer security and compliance solutions, while drastically minimizing the total cost. Qualys solutions include continuous monitoring, vulnerability management, policy compliance, PCI compliance, security assessment questionnaire, web application scanning, web application firewall, and more.
Besides its security suites, inside the website, Qualys provides:
- Server testing (certificate and configuration)
- Browser testing (SSL test)
- SSL pulse (other websites grade)
- Documentation of SSL/TLS
How does Qualys scan work?
As mentioned above, there are at least 7 vulnerability assessments to help you fix the vulnerabilities found early on your website.
AssetView
AssetView is one of the free services by Qualys that detects and organizes all assets that you own, both you know and you don’t know. It is fully cloud-based, so it’s easy to deploy and scales to millions of your assets. With this, you don’t need anymore to manually inventory, reduce errors, and save time.
Vulnerability Management (VM)
Qualys Vulnerability Management (VM) checks your servers, computers, and other devices for vulnerabilities and helps you identify the patches you need to download to fix them.
It keeps track of the security problems it finds for each system and provides graphical reports that tell you which patches to use on which systems so that you can get the most improvement in security for the least effort
Continuous Monitoring (CM)
Qualys Continuous Monitoring (CM) detects changes in your perimeter that could be exploited and immediately notifies the IT staff so they can take appropriate action. It lets you easily configure rules and alerts so you can know and react as soon as something changes on your network.
ThreatPROTECT
Qualys ThreatPROTECT layers real-time threat information on top of vulnerability detections, so that you can prioritize remediation and eliminate the most serious threat found on your assets. This automated remediation prioritization is based on real-time indicators such as vulnerabilities with public exploits and active attacks. It will help you to take action faster to eliminate threats.
Policy Compliance (PC)
Qualys Policy Compliance (PC) performs automated security configuration assessments on IT systems throughout your network. Then, you will get reports with a comprehensive knowledge base that is mapped to prevalent security regulations, industry standards, and compliance frameworks.
Payment Card Industry (PCI) Compliance
Qualys PCI Compliance (PCI) details security requirements for members, merchants, and service providers that store, process or transmit cardholder data. It uses Network Security Scans to make sure all merchants are secured by scanning their IP addresses. This service is the easiest, most cost-effective, and highly automated way to achieve compliance with the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard.
Web Application Scanning (WAS)
Qualys Web Application Scanning (WAS) provides automated crawling and testing of custom web applications to identify vulnerabilities including cross-site scripting (XSS) and SQL injection. This service proactively scans websites for malware infections, sending alerts to website owners to help prevent black listing and brand reputation damage.
Web Application Firewall (WAF)
If WAS is Qualys vulnerability detection for web apps, then WAF is the protection for web apps. It blocks attacks and patches web application vulnerabilities found by WAS. WAF gives you complete visibility into its data for continuous monitoring, risk assessments, and remediation plans.
Malware Detection
Qualys also provides a quick malware scan for websites and then executes immediate and automated alerts along with in-depth reporting to enable prompt identification and resolution.
Who can use Qualys?
The vulnerability solutions provided by Qualys are customizable for customers across multiple segments, including the majority of the Fortune 500 and Forbes Global 2000. It matches the security needs of:
- Small to medium businesses
- Enterprise
- Consultants
- Managed service provider
- Government
Since Qualys is a cloud-based SaaS vulnerability service, it is available 24x7x365 and can be accessed anytime from anywhere through a web browser. Qualys consistently maintains 99% availability. The service is constantly updated transparently, without any interruption to users, and is only taken off-line once a quarter for maintenance and updates.
Why should I use Qualys?
It provides free service
It includes SSL test, Global AssetView, CertView, CloudView, Browser Check, 60 days remote endpoint protection, API security assessment, and Community Edition.
The premium service provides great vulnerability assessments right for any type of company
Qualys provides many great features inside the Qualys Cloud Platform for vulnerability assessments. It includes CyberSecurity Asset Management, Threat Protection, Vulnerability Management, Detection, and Response, Patch Management, Continuous Monitoring, Endpoint Protection, and many more.
Can be accessed anytime and anywhere through web browsers
If you want to run a test or assessment using Qualys on your website, you can do it directly through your browser. As Qualys is a cloud-based service, all its features can be accessed online anytime and anywhere you want.
All work automatically
Qualys does all of the scanning and assessments automatically. You just need to choose which assessments to do, let them work, and wait for the report. So easy and time-saving.
Instant and comprehensive reports
For the result of your vulnerability assessments or your assets view, Qualys provides the reports in instant and comprehensive with detailed information and knowledge base.
Is Qualys free?
Qualys is a free-premium SaaS. You can get a free trial of the premium Qualys Cloud Platform.
However, Qualys also provides the full 100% free Community Edition that you can use without charges.
How is Qualys pricing?
To find out Qualys’ pricing tier, try the free trial by filling in the form.
How to use Qualys?
Pros
- Cloud-based
- Easy to use
- Works automatically
- Continuous monitoring
- Provide a very detailed report
Cons
- Premium plans are quite pricey
- Need all licensed modules to be effective therefore you need to pay more
- Long time scanning
What are the alternatives to Qualys?
- Intruder – cloud-based vulnerability scanner with automated results.
- Detectify – website security service by the best ethical hackers.
- ImmuniWeb – application security service using AI.
- Probely – security testing add-on with automated vulnerability scanning.
- Pentest Tools – penetration testing service for website and infrastructure.
- Observatory – the most detailed website security checker on the internet.
Conclusion
Qualys is a free online service that performs a deep analysis of the configuration of any SSL web server on the public internet. It also offers various vulnerability assessments to secure your website from breaches. The big advantage of Qualys is that you don’t need to download any apps since they can be accessed through your browsers and do the work right away. There are free and premium services by Qualys.
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